Biographies of distinguished scientific men. First seriesArago, F. (François)
History
Biographies of distinguished scientific men. First series
Arago, F. (François)
Scientists -- Biography
You begin to see, Gentlemen, the advantage that a firm and able lawyer
might have drawn from the authentic facts that I have just been
relating. But Bailly knew the pretended jury before whom he had to
appear. This jury was not a collection of drunken cobblers, whatever
some passionate writers may have asserted; it was worse than that,
Gentlemen, notwithstanding the deservedly celebrated names that were
occasionally interspersed among them: it was--let us cut the subject
short--an odious, commission.
The very circumscribed list from which chance in 1793 and 1794 drew the
juries of the Revolutionary Tribunals, did not embrace, as the sacred
word _jury_ seems to imply, all one class of citizens. The authorities
formed it, after a prefatory and very minute inquiry, of their
adherents only. The unfortunate defendants were thus judged not by
impartial persons free from any preconceived system, but by political
enemies, which is as much as to say, by that which is the most cruel and
remorseless in the world.
Bailly would not be defended. After his appearance as a witness in the
trial of Marie Antoinette, the ex-Mayor only wrote and had printed for
circulation, a paper entitled _Bailly to his fellow-citizens_. It closes
with these affecting words:
"I have only gained by the Revolution that which my fellow-citizens have
gained: liberty and equality. I have lost by it some useful situations,
and my fortune is nearly destroyed. I could be happy with what remains
of it to me and a clear conscience; but to be happy in the repose of my
retreat, I require, my dear fellow-citizens, your esteem: I know well
that, sooner or later, you will do me justice; but I require it while I
live, and while I am yet amongst you."
Our colleague was unanimously condemned. We should despair of the
future, unless such a unanimity struck all friends of justice and
humanity with stupor, if it did not increase the number of decided
adversaries to all political tribunals.
When the President of the Tribunal interrogated the accused, already
declared guilty, as to whether he had any reclamations to make relative
to the execution of the sentence, Bailly answered:
"I have always carried out the law; I shall know how to submit myself to
it, since you are its organ."
The illustrious convict was led back to his cell.
Bailly had said in his eloge on M. de Tressan: "French gaiety produces
the same effect as stoicism." These words occurred to my memory at the
time when I was gathering from various sources the proof that on
reentering the Conciergerie after his condemnation, Bailly showed
himself at once both gay and stoical.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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